The puzzle is available here.
Hi everyone. Lark is a relatively new setter in the Indy so I came to this puzzle not knowing quite what to expect. What I found was a generous helping of intricately constructed clues, some for which I had to rely on the wordplay, balanced by those where the definition was the route to the answer. Plenty to enjoy – thanks Lark!
Definitions are underlined in the clues below. In the explanations, quoted indicators are in italics, specified [deletions] are in square brackets, and I’ve capitalised and emboldened letters which appear in the ANSWER. For clarity, I omit most link words and some juxtaposition indicators.
Across
1a Old artist following rock band, member of big fish’s entourage (6)
REMORA
O (old) and RA (artist) following REM (rock band). Remoras suck – in a good way!
4a “Flower”: hard for audience to spot this means a body of water (5,3)
IRISH SEA
IRIS (flower) + H (hard) + SEA, which sounds like (… for audience) SEE (to spot)
10a Making obscure knowledge challenging to acquire (9)
DARKENING
KEN (knowledge), which DARING (challenging) is to take in (to acquire)
11a Timeless opera getting royal accolade (5)
OSCAR
Without T (timeless) [t]OSCA (opera) + R (royal)
12a Copper overwhelmed by demand reviewed schedule for summer (10)
CALCULATOR
CU (copper) surrounded by (overwhelmed by) CALL (demand) + reversed (reviewed) ROTA (schedule)
13a Part of tedious speech to the West Bromwich Albion hosts (4)
BLAH
In reverse (to the West, in an across entry) BromwicH ALBion holds (hosts) the answer
16a Head of eighteenth century school (4)
ETON
The first letter (head) of Eighteenth + TON (century)
17a It snaps furiously at gorilla (9)
ALLIGATOR
An anagram of (furiously) AT GORILLA
19a Scandalously, Fleet Street scarcely covers spreader of disease (6,3)
TSETSE FLY
An anagram of (scandalously) FLEET, ST (street) and ScarcelY’s outer letters (covers)
22a Talked about process writing part for certain instruments (4)
REED
This sounds like (talked about) READ (process writing)
It took me far too long to see to read as to process writing. When I realised, I felt a bit of a silly!
24a Cord about to be cut by surgical procedure (4)
ROPE
RE (about) inserting (to be cut by) OP (surgical procedure)
25a Unknown lives in Dutch region, victim of Viking raid (4,6)
HOLY ISLAND
Y (unknown) and IS (lives) in HOLLAND (Dutch region)
27a The man’s going to ring magazine (5)
HELLO
HE’LL (the man’s going to) + O (ring)
29a Tight-lipped MI5 has departing very dignified leader embalmed (9)
MUMMIFIED
MUM (tight-lipped) + MI FI[v]E (5) which has no V (has departing very) + Dignified’s first letter (leader)
30a Horse‘s mate threatening to kick us (8)
PALOMINO
PAL (mate) OMINO[us] (threatening) removing (to kick) US
31a Messenger carried by another messenger (6)
HERMES
The answer is inside (carried by) anotHER MESsenger
Down
1d Obscure Communist law (6)
REDACT
RED (communist) + ACT (law)
2d The one writing lines left note received by stage actress (5,6)
MERYL STREEP
ME (the one writing) + RY (railway: lines) + L (left) + RE (note) inside (received by) STEP (stage)
3d Funeral uses dancing to expunge a feeling of sorrow (10)
RUEFULNESS
An anagram of (… dancing) FUNER[a]L USES omitting (to expunge) A
5d Cat initially resents everyone embracing new dog (7)
RAGDOLL
The first letter of (initially) Resents and ALL (everyone) holding (embracing) an anagram of (new) DOG
6d Sun triumphed over cold weather (4)
SNOW
S (sun) + WON (triumphed) reversed (over)
7d Dismiss ultimately deficient retainer (3)
SAC
SACk (dismiss) missing its last letter (ultimately deficient)
8d Yes, I must leave PM on fringes of remote county (8)
AYRSHIRE
AY (yes) + R[i]SHI (PM) without I (I must leave …) + the external letters (fringes) of RemotE
9d Bug government agency to catch villain (6)
CICADA
CIA (government agency) taking in (to catch) CAD (villain)
14d Novice hesitating to enter reformed humanist denomination (11)
LUTHERANISM
L (learner: novice) + ER (hesitating) going inside (to enter) an anagram of (reformed) HUMANIST
15d Is core of Dave Eggers novel confrontational? (10)
AGGRESSIVE
An anagram of (… novel) IS, the middle letters (core) of dAVe and EGGERS
18d Celebrities meeting cool 80s band (8)
STARSHIP
STARS (celebrities) next to (meeting) HIP (cool)
The wordplay is so helpful here I only bothered to check the band for the blog
20d Servant following order to procure books and falling short (7)
FOOTMAN
F (following) + OM (Order of Merit: order) around (to procure) OT (books) + ANd without the last letter (falling short)
21d One frequently downcast in company of master classical musician (2-2,2)
YO-YO MA
YO-YO (one frequently downcast) by (in company of) MA (master)
23d Sportswear company‘s commercial concepts essentially lacking (6)
ADIDAS
AD (commercial) + IDeAS (concepts) without the middle letter (essentially lacking)
26d First mouthful of cappuccino: fine start to one’s morning (4)
FOAM
F (fine) the first letter of (start to) One’s + AM (morning)
28d Lines containing nothing that amuses me (3)
LOL
L L (lines) containing O (nothing)
I very much enjoyed my previous encounter with Lark and I enjoyed this one too, I really like his/her style of clueing, it has a fresh and vibrant feel. I’d only heard of one of the two musicians/group of musicians referenced, no prizes for guessing it was the first.
Standing out for me were REED, PALOMINO, TSETSE FLY, HERMES and FOAM.
Many thanks to Lark and Kitty
REMORA was a jorum – borrowed from the Latin for “delay” – a few of those stuck to a shark would slow it down a bit.
Had to check RAGDOLL was a cat – also a verb in skateboarding, snowboarding, skiing, and video games.
Liked the fact that R[I]SH! in AYRSHIRE wasn’t the !RISH (SEA) recycled.
And the lift-and-separates “West BromwicH ALBbion” & “stage actress”.
Thanks L&K
Ditto what Kitty said re read and process writing. The penny didn’t drop until I looked here.
Thanks Kitty for the splendid blog and Lark for the puzzle.
A definite thumbs up from me. A great addition to the independent setters. Struggled to remember YO-YO MA but did eventually. I thought it strange that RAGDOLL as a breed of cat isn’t in the Chambers dictionary app yet it does appear (hyphenated) under ‘cat’ in the thesaurus app, in a list of breeds. Funnily enough, I took a little while to get the ‘process writing’ so that bit of wordplay seems to have worked quite well.
Very nice. I thought FOAM was great. Thanks, Lark and Kitty.
Always a pleasure to learn something new to me in the Indie cryptic (remora and ragdoll cat this time) so thanks Lark and Kitty. Yo-yo Ma was brilliant!
Thanks Lark and Kitty.
Good one.
Liked:
MUMMIFIE
YO-YO MA
FOAM
FOOTMAN
Very nice puzzle with some lovely surfaces and exceedingly economical wordplay in most clues. IRISH SEA, ALLIGATOR, READ, RUEFULNESS, SNOW, FOOTMAN, YO-YO MA, ADIDAS and FOAM is my rather long list of ticks.
Thanks Lark and Kitty
Struggled to recall the big fish’s entourage and didn’t know the name of the 18a band although I do remember enjoying ‘We built this city’.
Nicely constructed clues on display here, well done, setter!
It was the parsing of 22d that took quite some time, you weren’t alone in feeling silly, Kitty!
Favourite clues were those for OSCAR, HOLY ISLAND, PALOMINO, RAGDOLL (got Kitty’s name written all over it!), SAC & FOOTMAN.
Thanks to Lark for the puzzle and to Kitty for another great review.
REMORA and (as a breed of cat) RAGDOLL were new to us, but worked out from their clues, and we took ages deciding 22ac had to be REED. But overall an enjoyable solving experience; we liked CALCULATOR and YO-YO MA.
Thanks, Lark and Kitty.
Thanks Lark for a beautifully crafted crossword. I found much to enjoy with favourites being IRISH SEA (liked the acknowledge of solvers getting misdirected by the word flower), DARKENING (again, the surface seems to describe many clues by many setters), PALOMINO, MERYL STREEP, RAGDOLL (I liked the surface and I knew Kitty would confirm that it meant “cat” with pictorial evidence), and the very clever FOAM. I failed to solve HOLY ISLAND, unknown to me. Thanks Kitty for the blog.
I came here to find out why 22a was REED as it had to be, and I’m pleased to find I wasn’t alone in staring in bafflement at it! The fact that it’s so obvious in retrospect just makes the clue better.
Some lovely ideas here. MERYL STREEP is a classic of the “it must be, but why?” type (I was never going to construct it from the ground up), RAGDOLL and PALOMINO are nicely constructed surfaces, and FOAM is a lovely def. But however much we like to praise particular clues, it feels unfair when (as here) they all have a lot going for them. More please!